


Things That Go Bump In The Night

by Severina



Category: Live Free or Die Hard (2007)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-02-01
Updated: 2011-02-01
Packaged: 2017-10-15 06:57:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,342
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/158236
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Severina/pseuds/Severina
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Right, okay. So here’s the thing.” John heard Matt take a deep breath, and braced himself for another long-winded tangent. But apparently the kid was done. “I think my apartment is haunted.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Things That Go Bump In The Night

“McClane.”

“Hey. Hey! It’s you! I asked them to transfer me, you know, but I heard that you got this big promotion and I figured maybe I’d get sent to some low-level minion. But it’s you. Oh, it’s Matt, by the way. Matt Farrell?”

John pushed his paperwork aside, switched the phone to his left ear and leaned back in his chair, smiling despite himself. “Yeah, I got that, kid,” he said. “How you doing?”

“Me? Oh, I’m good. Mostly. Walking without a limp now, so. Yay.”

“Good,” John said. It had been months since he’d seen the kid, and the last time – when they’d both been schlepped to DC for the bullshit PR stunt, meet the mayor, get the medal, pose for photos, yada yada yada – Matt had been walking with a cane. And bitching every five seconds about it.

“So I guess you’re a big-wig now? Promotion and everything.”

John grunted. The memory of that meeting, Scalvino and the commissioner tying themselves in knots trying to make a fucking desk job sound _exciting_ , was one he wouldn’t soon forget. Nor the looks on their faces when he said he’d hand in his badge first. “Turned it down, kid.”

“Yeah?” Matt said. “Yeah. Can’t imagine you stuck behind a desk, McClane.”

“Fate worse than death,” John agreed.

“Yeah,” Matt said again. “So. You’re probably busy. Lots of SUV’s to blow up and fire extinguishers to shoot. Just don’t shoot yourself in the shoulder again, ‘cause the first time, McClane? Nuts, okay? In case I didn’t make that clear enough in the hospital. But… yeah. I shouldn’t keep you. Except… I have this… thing.”

He heard Matt huff out a breath, restrained himself from barking _out with it_ into the receiver. He remembers this from the fourth, the way Matt would motor on unless he nipped it in the bud. Not that he actually minded very much then. Not that he minds very much now.

“You have a thing?”

“A… problem.”

“Are the feds giving you a hard time?” John asked sharply. Because Bowman may have promised him that the kid would be left alone, but the feebs lie, and sometimes an old cop can’t tell when they’re lying.

“No, no, it’s not the feds, man. Bowman’s been totally cool… well, as cool as a federal agent can be, which is… not really cool at all, actually. He even offered me a job.” Matt snorted. “Yeah, it took me about 2.4 seconds to turn that down flat. Can you imagine me working for the government?”

“Not even a little bit,” John said dryly.

“Right? So. No. This is another thing.”

When Matt said nothing more, John sighed. “Got a line of SUV’s piling up in the elevator shaft, kid—“

“Right.” Matt laughed a little shakily before clearing his throat. “Okay, so I’m just going to come right out and say it,” he said. “But you should know that I am well aware that it sounds completely insane, okay? Like you’re going to want to call the guys with the butterfly nets, but just bear with me. Because seriously, McClane, I have this natural aversion to straightjackets and I’m _so_ not into that kind of bondage, and—“

“Kid,” John warned.

“Right, okay. So here’s the thing.” John heard Matt take a deep breath, and braced himself for another long-winded tangent. But apparently the kid was done. “I think my apartment is haunted.”

John waited a moment for the punchline before he realized there wasn’t going to be one. “You’re serious,” he said.

“I know how it sounds, McClane, I _told_ you. But there’s all these weird noises and clanging sounds and I _checked_ and there was a murder here in ’83, some drug deal that went sour and—“

“What the fuck, kid? What do you expect me to do, perform an exorcism?” Out of the corner of his eye John saw Henderson look up from his desk, his expression a mixture of curiosity and amusement. John shot him a look until the other cop arched a brow and looked away.

“I don’t know” Matt burst out. He could almost see the kid shrugging helplessly. “But I mean, who else am I gonna call?”

“Ghostbusters?”

“Ha, yeah. Well, Venkman and Egon are probably busy. But… I was kinda hoping maybe you weren’t?”

John was silent. Around him, the precinct bustled with activity, but he heard and saw nothing of it. He was too busy remembering the way Matt’s eyes lit up whenever he got excited (most of the time), and the way his long fingers slashed the air when he talked. The way he tossed his too-long hair out of his eyes when he wanted to make sure you were listening to him, and the way he hid behind it when he wanted to be unobtrusive. John had spent the last several months trying to get those images out of his head, telling his body that just because it _wanted_ didn’t mean it should _get_ , and he honestly didn’t know if he could resist a second round of Matthew Farrell.

Apparently he was quiet for too long, because Matt took his silence for refusal. “Oh. But. I guess you’re… yeah, you have a lot of… okay, well, I can just—“

“Was just checking my schedule, kid,” John interrupted. “I’ve got tonight free.”

“Really? That’s… okay, great!”

The relief in Matt’s voice made John feel like a dirty old man. Matt Farrell was a kid. A kid who needed his help, who reached out to the one authority figure he could trust. There was nothing more to it than that. So he’d go over and take a look around and put Matt’s mind at ease, and then he’d leave and Matt would be nothing more than a name on his Christmas card list. No different than Zeus and Al and Carmine and Zanetti and a dozen other guys who came into his life for brief moments and then left again.

The fact that he _felt_ different about Matt doesn’t factor into the equation. Not at all.

“I’ll make you dinner,” Matt was saying, “as a thank you. Tonight? About seven?”

“Sounds good, kid,” John said.

After scratching down Matt’s new address on a battered legal pad, John said his goodbyes and set the receiver down softly. He rubbed a hand over his head then down to his chin, wondered if he’d have time to shave down before he left the precinct. He shook his head, then reached for the phone and dialled a number.

“Hey, Susan,” he greeted. “John McClane. … Good, good. Listen, I need to cancel my appointment with Mark tonight. … Yeah. Something came up.”

At the desk across from him, Henderson looked up and grinned. John ignored it.

* * *

Matt’s new apartment was on the fourth floor, and John decided immediately to forgo the elevator in favour of the stairs. He used the time to remind himself that this was a favour from one friend to another, nothing more. But when he got to the door, he still smoothed a hand down his jacket and then over his freshly shorn scalp, realized what he was doing, and called himself ten kinds of fool.

“Hey,” Matt said at his knock. “Thanks, hi, come in. Hey, it’s great to see you.”

“Yeah,” John managed. “You too, kid.”

Matt was still wearing the same style of loose jeans, a similar T-shirt-with-unidentifiable-logo that John remembered from the summer. But this time the jeans looked new and the T-shirt neatly pressed, and… and the kid had shaved, maybe trimmed his hair a little. The overall effect made him look simultaneously older and younger, and made John just the tiniest bit breathless. He shook his head, held out the bottle in his hand. “This is for you.”

“Oh, wow, you didn’t have to—“ He squinted at the bottle, grinned in appreciation. “2004 merlot. Nice.”

“That’s what the salesclerk said,” John said. He shrugged out of his jacket, saw nowhere to put it so tossed it over one of the chairs.

“Yeah, no, it’s… yeah, I have absolutely no idea. I’m sure it’s great,” Matt said as he walked toward the small kitchenette. “I hope it goes with meat loaf. That’s pretty much the only thing I can make, and anything where ketchup as one of the main ingredients is a sure-fire winner with me. I hope... you like meatloaf, right McClane?”

“Meatloaf’s fine,” John said. He wandered further into the living room, trailed his hand over a table crowded with tiny metallic bits and pieces jumbled next to a pair of eight inch action figures. He ran a finger lightly over a green clad figure that appeared to have horns. “I see you’re starting up your doll collection again,” he called out.

“That _doll collection_ ,” Matt said, reappearing at his side with a wine-filled glass, “is going to pay for my retirement. Unless of course you break everything again, so, you know…” He looked pointedly at John’s hand, still resting on the head of the green doll.

John lifted a hand carefully away from the figure and raised it in surrender before taking the offered glass. He arched a brow. “Scooby Doo?”

“I don’t have wine glasses, okay? Anyway, Scooby is classic. Actually, that thing is probably worth money too. I’ve got the complete set from A&W in the ‘70’s. You know, we probably shouldn’t even be using them.”

“It’s a _glass_ , Matt.”

“Yeah, and you’re like… kryptonite around my valuables or something, McClane.” He reached for the glass, took a step forward at the same time that John did, and when Matt’s long lean body pressed against his John's first thought was that this is what it must be like for those dumb fucks who stick a fork in a toaster, this spark and sizzle and heat.

“Jeez, kid,” John managed to get out, “is there anything in this place I can touch?”

“Um,” Matt said.

The press of Matt’s lips, warm and soft and tasting slightly of spaghetti sauce, was the last thing in the world John expected. He felt his eyes widen, felt his heart race in a way it hadn’t in years, in a way it felt like it never _had_ , but before he could do more than begin to process this new information Matt was pulling away, his face an expression of surprise-fear-lust that would have been comical under any other circumstance.

“Okay,” Matt said frantically, “so I totally didn’t mean to do that. I mean, not right then. And if you’re gonna punch me in the nose just go ahead, but I _had_ to, McClane. You were right there and man, I’ve been wanting to do that for the past five months and I can’t get you out of my head, and it’s, the whole thing, it’s been driving me crazy and I hope I didn’t just ruin our friendship but—“

John surged forward, wrapped a hand in the fabric of Matt’s T-shirt and yanked. When Matt was pressed against him again it felt _right_ , and when John smashed his lips back against Matt’s it felt more than right, it felt _perfect_. Matt uttered a little ‘oof’ of surprise and then his mouth opened beneath his, and John plunged his tongue inside, chased that taste of spaghetti sauce and something more, a sweet sugary flavour that he couldn’t get enough of, that he was already beginning to think of as _Matt_.

“Five months?” he finally said when he managed to pull himself away from those lips. “Jesus, kid, what took you so long?”

“Me?” Matt squeaked out. “You’re the big take-charge guy. You should have—“

John didn’t stop to find out what he _should have_ , because he got right back to _doing_. And though he really did think of himself as a take-charge guy, he wasn’t sure how he ended up on the sofa, back propped up on a large lumpy pillow and Matt sprawled against him, one leg hooked casually over his. His hands pulled at Matt’s stupid T-shirt to crawl over the smooth skin of his back and Matt shivered, his long fingers framing John’s face and his perfect lips licking his mouth open, teasing until John growled somewhere deep in his throat and his hand rose to tug at Matt’s hair, and he deepened the kiss and felt Matt smile against his mouth.

John felt nothing but their heartbeats, heard nothing but the panting of their shared breaths, and when Matt suddenly squirmed away John at first was only mesmerized by his lips, swollen red and full, and his messy hair. He blinked, thinking only of smoothing that hair back so he could tousle it again, tangle his fingers in those long strands, angle Matt’s head just right and kiss him loose-limbed and weak-kneed.

“That’s it! That’s—“ Matt flailed wildly, and John darted back just in time to avoid the flat of Matt’s palm on a collision course with his nose, and wouldn’t that be a treat to explain to the boys in the bullpen in the morning. He blinked again, suddenly aware of a high-pitched clanging from somewhere in the walls, and shook his head. “That’s it, that noise, that’s the poltergeist, that’s—“

“That’s your pipes,” John said mildly.

“That’s the… what?”

“You got a laundry room in this building?”

“I… what? Yeah, on the—“

“There ya go,” John said. “Building’s old. Pipes, Matthew. Your poltergeist is water running through the pipes.”

“Wow,” Matt said. “Seriously? Okay… wow. You know, I’d feel like a real idiot, except…” He made a gesture which took in their legs still entwined on the sofa, the close press of John’s body against his, and grinned.

“Yeah,” John said. He reached out for Matt’s hand and tugged, sending the kid sprawling back against him. “You can call me over to chase ghosts any time, kid.”

“You know,” Matt said, running a hand lightly over John’s chest, “I’m going to hold you to that, McClane.”

“John.”

“John,” Matt repeated softly. “Yeah. I like that.”


End file.
